ABOVE: Detail from Canaletto’s Venice, the Grand Canal, Looking Northeast from Palazzo Balbi to the Rialto Bridge (circa 1730), the most expensive art purchase of 2005.

Finally, a list we can approve of. That “greatest painter” nonsense from earlier in the year was a methodological atrocity, based on totally subjective criteria and blut statistical instrumentation. Luckily, the bean-counters at Forbes ride to the rescue today with a rundown of the most expensive art auction purchases of the year. It’s positively mathemagic.

The duopoly of Sotheby’s and Christie’s control 95% of all worldwide art auctions, Forbes notes. Christie’s moved $759 million worth of merchandise through its New York outlet alone, but Sotheby’s had the distinction of hammering the largest single price for a painting this year, a Canaletto (above), which fetched $32.6 million from an anonymous phone buyer. Spokesbots for both Sotheby’s and Christies were preening for the press and remain bullish—well of course they would, wouldn’t they?—for 2006, predicting that all those newly minted Russian oil billionaires and Indian techno-tycoons will move on the art market in a serious way, keeping prices buoyant.

LINK: Forbes > Most Expensive Art 2005